PASSERES OSCINES FRINGILLID.E. 63 



flocks all the while it is with us, and comes into full song just before it 

 leaves. In pleasant weather it retires to the woods, and keeps close in 

 the shrubbery of thickets and ravines ; but snow-storms send it troop- 

 ing to our door-steps, even in the heart of the city. We still see it in 



Fig. 37.— Snow-bird. 



the bits of ground about our K and N street houses, in the honeysuckle 

 and wistaria vines, the climbing rose-bushes over the back porch, and 

 the hibiscus shrub. 



Many who suppose the Snow-bird to belong to the high north are sur- 

 prised at the suddenuess with which it appears and disappears accord- 

 ing to the weather, wondering how it can accomplish the supposed long 

 journey so quickly. But the bird breeds anywhere in what is known as 

 the "Canadian Faunal Province," which, only coming down to sea level 

 in the latitude of Middle New England, stretches south along the Appa- 

 lachian chains to the Carolinas, and even Georgia. We have ourselves 

 found the nest of the Snow bird south of the latitude of Washington, 

 among the higher mountains of Virginia. Under these circumstances, 

 it is, of course, only a matter of a day or two for the birds to visit us 

 from their summer homes, and to retire on occasion to their mountain 

 fastnesses. [261] 



94. (128.) Spizella monticola ( Gm. ) Bd. Tree Sparrow. 



With the exception of Melospiza fasciata, this is our most abundant 

 winter Sparrow. It comes late from the North, usually not till the 1st of 

 November, and is off, returning in the spring, about the 1st of April. It 

 is a hardy, cheery little bird, enduring great cold without inconvenience, 

 and singing its merry stave under the most dreary surroundings. It is 

 almost always seen in flocks haunting the heart of the briar-patches and 

 other mostimpenetrable shrubbery. In former years, when the " slashes" 



